Proposals onA Check-Up and Purge of the R.C.P.(B.) Membership[1]

Written:Written in June, not later than 21, 1921Published:First published in 1959 inLenin Miscellany XXXVI.

      Printed from the manuscript.Source:Lenin
	  Collected Works,

      3nd English Printing,

      Progress Publishers,1977,

      Moscow,Volume 42,

      pages315b-316a.Translated:Bernard IsaacsTranscription\Markup:D. WaltersPublic Domain:Lenin Internet Archive

      (2003).You may freely copy, distribute,
	display and perform this work; as well as make derivative and
	commercial works. Please credit “Marxists Internet
	Archive” as your source.•README

Thechief group responsible for registration should be made
up of old Party members (not less than 5-7 years in the Party), necessarily
workers.

Allmembers of the R.C.P. who are in any way dubious, unreliable, or
who have failed to prove their stability, should be removed from the Party,
with the right of re-admission upon further verification and test.

1)Peoplewho joined from other parties after X.1917;

2) members from among officials and functionaries who hadheld office under the old governments;

3) people who had held posts involving any privileges;

4) state employees—these categories should all be subject to a thorough
check-up, and workers, both Party and non-Party, who have had contact with
the given member of the R.C.P. at his work, should be questioned.

Recommendingmembers should be required to give an accurate, written
testimonial and should have among them several workers with a length of
Party membership of 5-7 years.

Formalitiesshould be reduced to a minimum in the case a of real
workers, actually working at their factory, and in the case of peasants
engaged on their allotments; such people should not be troubled with
reregistration.

[1]Lenin’sproposals were adopted at a meeting of the Politbureau on June
21, 1921, as directives for the Party Purge Commission. They were included,
with certain amendinents, in the decision of the Politbureau of June 25
concerning the check-up, revision and purge of the Party. In connection
with the drafting of this decision Lenin jotted down notes concerning the
conditions of admission to the Party (seeCollected Works,Fifth
[Russian] Edition, Vol. 43, p. 362). Lenin’s remarks were also taken into
consideration in the decision adopted by the Central Committee.